Islanders upend Avs, 4-1

In Denver, the Colorado Avalanche had no serious answer for the New York Islanders’ Thomas Greiss who made 30 saves in a 4-1 win for the Isles.

Four different skaters struck for the Isles including Anders Lee, Jordan Eberle, Johnny Boychuk, and Valtteri Filppula.

Johnny Boychuk scored his first goal of the season in win over Avs – file photo courtesy of Lewis Bleiman

The game turned on the Avs’ inability to crack the Isles’ special teams on the penalty kill; they 1-for-5 on the power play.

“That was huge,” New York coach Barry Trotz said. “That was a game-changer. If they score there, that could’ve been a game-changer. We actually got some momentum off of that.

“That’s the thing with the special teams sometimes. Power plays can pull momentum away from you, just because you’re expecting to score. If it doesn’t go well, the penalty-killing team gets the momentum. We killed that off and gave us some momentum, gave us a little extra juice in the back end of that period.”

The Avs’ only goal came from Gabriel Landeskog on the power play.

Mikko Rantanen‘s streak of 14 games with a point ended in the loss.

“Yeah, it’s a long time,” Rantanen said. “My linemates have been helping, like I say in every interview. The team has helped me too. I don’t really think about it too much. There’s so many games left, and our goal is to stay in the top three in the (Central) division and make the playoffs.”

The Isles were 2-for-4 on their power play.

“Our special teams ended up being pretty big for us tonight,” Trotz said. “It’s a good team win. I thought a majority of the guys were going. We played the right way for the most part. We defended, we sort of just did what we had to do. Frustrated them a little bit, I think, and we were able to capitalize when we did have some chances.”

[WATCH: All Islanders vs. Avalanche highlights]

Semyon Varlamov made 17 saves in the loss.

“I’m not concerned, I believe in our team and what we’re capable of doing. I just feel like we’re not as sharp, as crisp as we were earlier. That’s why we win one, lose one. The urgency has to come back into our game. I didn’t feel like our team was real urgent from the drop of the puck, and they were,” Avs head coach Jared Bednar said after the loss.